Latest update December 21st, 2024 1:52 AM
Chris Ram challenges AG to produce evidence of tax payments Guyana made to GRA on behalf of Exxon and partners
Kaieteur News – Chartered Accountant and Attorney-at-Law, Christopher Ram, along with Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Anil Nandlall, have find themselves embroiled in a debate regarding the utilization of funds from Guyana’s Natural Resource Fund (NRF) to address tax liabilities incurred by ExxonMobil and its partners in the Stabroek Block. The dispute arises from the terms of the Production Sharing Agreement (PSA) governing the deep-water block, which obliges Guyanese authorities to finance the companies’ tax payments utilizing oil revenues stored in the NRF.
Ram, in one of his most recent columns in Stabroek News, found that the NRF is holding $276 Billion which should have been transferred to the Guyana Revenue Authority (GRA) for the Exxon-led consortium. The lawyer then urged for the relevant authorities to fix this bloated state of the account.
In response to Ram’s findings, Nandlall pointed out that no provision in the NRF law allows for transfers to GRA. It only allows for transfers to the Consolidated Fund. “In fact, any unauthorised withdrawal from or interference with monies from the Fund constitutes an Offence, upon conviction, is liable to imprisonment and several million dollars in fine,” the AG said.
Nandlall said too that the NRF Act features a supremacy provision at Section 45 which states: “in the event of any inconsistency between the provisions of this Act and the provisions of any other law on fiscal matters and financial management, or between the provisions of the Act and the terms of a petroleum license, the provisions of this Act shall prevail.”
Nandall also argued that it matters not if the tax payments are in the NRF or with GRA; the fact is that it is in a government account and would be transferred to the National Treasury as per the withdrawal rules of the NRF.
By way of a letter to the press, Ram made it clear that from the outset, he has concurred that the NRF Act does not provide for the withdrawal of money from the Fund to pay the taxes for the oil companies. Ram insisted however that this needs to be rectified.
He further noted that he does not agree with Nandlall’s referencing of a “supremacy provision” in the NRF Act. Ram said a case in which the very AG was involved in shows that laws are not always supreme to contracts.
“I need to remind him of the Rudisa v Guyana case [2014] CCJ (OJ) in which he was lead Counsel for Guyana. The judges lost no time in rejecting his argument that a failure by Guyana to honour its Treaty obligation was somehow excusable because of good faith efforts by the then PPP/C Government,” said Ram.
Continuing on the same case he said, “Ruling against Guyana, the CCJ unanimously re-affirmed the legal principle ‘pacta sunt servanda’ (“agreements must be respected). Just in case Anil thinks that the reason for the CCJ’s decision was that the matter arose solely out of the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas, it is in fact a long-standing principle laid down in Trendex Corporation v Central Bank of Nigeria [1977] 1 QB 529 that sovereign immunity, including lawmaking, does not generally apply to commercial cases.”
Given Nandlall’s position on the case, Ram challenged the AG to provide a schedule with particulars of the Certificates of Taxes issued by the Guyana Revenue Authority to the oil companies as well as to state the source of the money used to pay such taxes for the oil companies.
If no Certificates of Taxes were issued, Ram asked the AG to state whether there any other receipts, acknowledgments, documents or confirmation from the GRA to the oil companies of taxes paid on their behalf.
- Anil Nandlall, Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Attorney-at-Law, Chartered Accountant, Chris Ram, S.C.
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